The present invention relates to a galvanizing furnace and a method for operation of a galvanizing furnace.
Such galvanizing furnaces are used in hot-dip galvanizing plants and serve for heating molten zinc. The galvanizing furnace is generally comprised of a furnace housing with a galvanizing vat arranged therein. The furnace housing typically has a rectangular cross-section. For this purpose, the furnace housing has two opposite longitudinal sidewalls as well as two opposite end walls, wherein the longitudinal sidewalls are larger than the end walls.
Burners, in particular gas burners, are typically used to heat the molten zinc in the galvanizing vat. In each case, these burners heat the furnace interior by means of a flame tube between the walls of the furnace housing and the galvanizing vat. Furthermore, electrically heated galvanizing furnaces are also known.
A widely-used burner system for such galvanizing furnaces operates with gas burners in the form of high-speed burners. These high-speed burners are provided at the diagonally opposite corners of the furnace housing. In each case, the high-speed burners are supported in an end wall of the furnace housing such that the flame produced by the respective high-speed burner is conducted into the interspace between a longitudinal sidewall of the furnace housing and a wall of the galvanizing vat opposite this longitudinal sidewall. Depending on the size and output of the galvanizing furnace, also multiple high-speed burners can be installed above one another in the diagonally opposite corners of the furnace housing.
To protect against the high flame temperatures of the high-speed burner, the corner areas of the galvanizing vat, which are directly opposite the flame outlets of the high-speed burners, are clad on their outer sides with flame deflector plates and thus are protected.
During the operation of such galvanizing furnaces wear effects develop which affect particularly the galvanizing vat. It has been shown that the wall thickness of the galvanizing vat is reduced during the operation of the galvanizing furnace. With progressive wear, the galvanizing vat wall thickness is reduced to the extent that the entire galvanizing vat must be replaced, which requires costly engineering effort. It is particularly disadvantageous that this involves substantial downtimes of the galvanizing furnace, i.e. undesirably low galvanizing furnace availability.